Would health care reform reduce abortions?

The Associated PressMichigan Democrat Bart Stupak got an amendment in the House of Representatives health care reform bill that would restrict subsidies for abortion. A less-restrictive bill in the Senate is drawing opposition from pro-life activists.As a vote on health care reform looms in the Senate, prominent anti-abortion groups are mounting an effort to persuade Democrats to vote down the bill because it doesn't include further restrictions on abortion.

The House earlier passed a version of the legislation that includes an amendment from Michigan Rep. Bart Stupak restricting subsidies for any plan that provides abortion coverage. The bill in the Senate is more of a compromise.

But are anti-abortion activists misguided in their efforts? In a Washington Post column T.R. Reid argues that killing health care reform would actually result in more abortions:

Increasing health-care coverage is one of the most powerful tools for reducing the number of abortions -- a fact proved by years of experience in other industrialized nations. All the other advanced, free-market democracies provide health-care coverage for everybody. And all of them have lower rates of abortion than does the United States.

This is not a coincidence. There's a direct connection between greater health coverage and lower abortion rates. To oppose expanded coverage in the name of restricting abortion gets things exactly backward ...

The latest United Nations comparative statistics demonstrate the point clearly. The U.N. data measure the number of abortions for women ages 15 to 44. They show that Canada, for example, has 15.2 abortions per 1,000 women; Denmark, 14.3; Germany, 7.8; Japan, 12.3; Britain, 17.0; and the United States, 20.8. When it comes to abortion rates in the developed world, we're No. 1.

No one could argue that Germans, Japanese, Brits or Canadians have more respect for life or deeper religious convictions than Americans do. So why do they have fewer abortions?

One key reason seems to be that all those countries provide health care for everybody at a reasonable cost. That has a profound effect on women contemplating what to do about an unwanted pregnancy.

He's referring to expanded health care coverage in general and doesn't address pro-lifers' specific concerns about what is in the legislation. But still, it's an unconventional argument in a debate that has resulted in no shortage of hysterics. Anybody convinced?